DECP: A Distributed Election Clustering Protocol for

Heterogeneous Wireless Sensor Networks

Xianghui Wang and Guoyin Zhang
College of Computer Science and Technology, Harbin Engineering University, 150001
Harbin, China
Wangxianghui@hrbeu.edu.cn

Abstract. Heterogeneous wireless sensor networks are energy limited and

imbalance networks, load balancing and energy efficiency is the most
challenging task in these networks. In this paper, we propose a distributed
election clustering protocol to prolong the stable region of wireless sensor
networks, which is based on remaining energy and communication cost to elect
suitable cluster-head nodes. Compared with classical clustering protocol, our
protocol can maintain load balancing of networks, and extremely prolong the
stable region of network lifetime.
Keywords: wireless sensor networks, cluster, heterogeneous.

1 Introduction
Wireless sensor networks have been envisioned to have a wide range of application in
both military and civilian domains [1]. Due to the limitation of sensor node energy,
researchers have designed lots of energy-efficient routing protocols to prolong the
lifetime of sensor networks. These protocols are mainly for homogeneous sensor
networks, and hardly used in heterogeneous environments. In this paper, we propose
DECP, a new distributed election clustering protocol for tow-level heterogeneous
wireless sensor networks. DECP is heterogeneous-aware, in the sense that election
probabilities are weighted by residual energy and communication cost. When energy is
imbalance in local area, high energy node is prior to be the cluster head, and when
energy is balance, communication cost is considered first. This election mechanism
prolong the time interval before the death of the first node (stable region), which is
crucial for many applications where the feedback from the sensor network must be
reliable. We show by simulation that DECP could implement load balancing and
provides long stable region than the classical protocols LEACH [2] and SEP [3].

2 Clustering Parameters
In order to prolong the stable region, DECP attempts to maintain the constraint of well
balanced energy consumption. High energy nodes should have more opportunity to
Y. Shi et al. (Eds.): ICCS 2007, Part III, LNCS 4489, pp. 105108, 2007.
Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2007

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X. Wang and G. Zhang

become cluster-head, and low energy nodes should not be the cluster-head until there
are no high energy nodes within their detective range. We use Average Power
Distinction (APD) to evaluate the power level of node i .
APDi = 1

jNBRi

current

Ej

(1)

NBRi Eicurrent

N B R i is the set of neighbors of node i , which are located in the detective range of

nod i , and N B R i is the total number of nodes in N B R i . E ic u r r e n t is the current

residual energy of node i .
A P D i reflects the power distinction between the node i and its neighbors. If
A P D i is more than zero, node i is a high energy node, which means that node i have
more energy than his neighbors; if A P D i is less than zero, node i is a low energy
node, and should have less opportunity to be the cluster-head node.
In heterogeneous networks, we must both consider the average power distinction
and communication cost for cluster-head selection, so we use mCost to evaluate
communication cost in heterogeneous networks.
mCosti = (1 APDi )

jNBRi

di, j

NBRi

current

jNBRi

Ej

jNBRi

NBRi Eicurrent

di, j

(2)

d i , j is the distance between node i and node j , and this value should be computed by

receiving sensitivity. mCost provides a unified criterion for all nodes to select
cluster-head nodes, which means that all nodes could use mCost to select cluster-head
nodes, which is the nodes with high energy and low communication cost.

3 DECP Protocol
A clustered sensor network is partitioned to a number of clusters. Node i working as a
cluster-head node is denoted by chi . The set of all cluster-head nodes is denoted by
CH , CH N , where N is the set of all nodes including cluster-head nodes and
non-cluster-head nodes. Now we describe DECP protocol in detail.
In clustering process, all the nodes broadcast its current energy information
Energy_msg, and then overhear the energy message from the other nodes. When nodes
have sufficient information about its neighbors, such as distance and current energy,
nodes calculate mCost about itself and broadcast mCost to its neighbors. According to
mCost, each node selects the candidate node which has the minimal mCost, and sends
Vote_msg to the candidate node. The nodes which receive the most Vote_msg in
neighbors, will announce that the cluster-head nodes are elected, and all
non-cluster-head nodes chose one nearest cluster-head to join the cluster.

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107

Table 1. DECP protocol

1. x [ node(x).bcast(Energy_msg;Dst,all)]
2. if node i.hears_from(node j)
3. node i.Set_neighbor node j
4. node i.Set_energy node j.energy
5. x [ node(x).bcast(mCost_msg;Dst,all)]
6. if node i.hears_from(node j)
7. node i.Set_mCost node j.mCost
8. x, y, y node(x).Set_neighbor node(y).mCost=min(node(x).Set_mCost)
9. [ node(x).send(Vote_msg;Dst,node(y))]
10. if node i.receive_voteMsg_from(node j)
11. node i. ticket = node i.ticket+1
12. x [ node(x).bcast(Ticket_msg;Dst,all)]
13. if node i.hear _from(node j)
14. node i. Set_ticket node j.ticket
15. x , [ if node(x).ticket > max(node(x).Set_ticket),
16.
CH node(x) ]
17. x, x CH [ node(x).bcast(ClustHead_msg;Dst,all)
18 if node i.hears_from(node j)
19. node i.Set_CH node j
20. x, x N-CH, y, y node(x).Set_CH (y is the nearest cluster-head for x)
21. [node(x).join(node(y))]

4 Simulation and Evaluation

We simulate a wireless network of 100 nodes in a 100100 square area using
MATLAB, and the sink node is located in the center of the area. We assume that m is
the percentage of the nodes which are equipped with a times more energy than the
normal nodes. The initial energy of normal node is 0.1J, so the initial energy of advance
node is 0.5( a + 1) J. In order to measure the energy consumption for data transmission,
we used the same energy consumption model introduced in [4], using radio electronics
energy E e le c = 5 0 n j / b it , radio amplifier fs = 1 0 p j / b it / m 2 , the consumption of data
fusion E fu sio n = 5 n j / b it / m e s s a g e , 2000 bit-size sensed data package and 50 byte-size
broadcast package.

Fig. 1. Number of live nodes

Fig. 2. Contrast of APC/APN

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We compare the performance of DECP protocol with LEACH and SEP in the same
heterogeneous setting, where m =0.2 and a =4.
Figure1 shows that DECP extremely extend the stable region compared to LEACH
by 102.16% and SEP by 49.17%. On the other hand, DECP increase the ratio of stable
region in network lifetime. In DECP, the ratio is 40.31%, in LEACH and SEP it is
13.11% and 19.91%. DECP select high energy nodes to be the cluster-head for load
balancing, and low energy nodes spend less energy than high energy nodes. So DECP
avoid the death of low energy nodes too earlier and prolong the stable region of the
wireless sensor networks.
Figure2 shows that the APC/APN of DECP is higher than LEACH and SEP.
APC/APN is the ratio of average power of cluster-head nodes and non-cluster-head
nodes. If APC/APN more than one, it means that the cluster-head nodes have more
average energy than non-cluster-head nodes; if APC/APN is equal one, it means that
the cluster-head nodes have the same average energy as non-cluster-head nodes.
LEACH use random arithmetic to select cluster-head nodes, so APC/APN is
approximately equal one. In SEP, the advance nodes have more opportunity to be the
cluster-head, but the arithmetic still use random mechanism to select cluster-head, so
the APC/APN is just more than one. DECP has the best performance in APC/APN,
because DECP do not use random mechanism for cluster-head selecting, thus DECP
could accurately select the high energy node with low communication cost to be the
cluster-head, and implement load balancing.
We also analyze the performance of DECP with different m and a , the experiment
result show that the stable region of DECP is far more than that of LEACH and SEP,
even in the homogeneous networks ( a =0).

5 Conclusion
In this paper, we present DECP, a distributed election clustering protocol for tow-level
heterogeneous wireless sensor networks. Our protocol does not need any of global
energy knowledge at clustering process. As long as nodes exchange local information,
cluster-head nodes could be selected. Furthermore, DECP is scalable as it dose not
required any of exact position of each node in the filed. Our protocol use local energy
information and communication cost for clustering, it is prolong the stable stage of the
wireless sensor networks.

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